


with just enough love to go round

by thelandofnothing



Series: on the hillside i remember (i am loving losing life) [4]
Category: A Song of Ice and Fire - George R. R. Martin, Game of Thrones (TV)
Genre: Angst, F/M, Fluff, Future Fic, Gen, after gendry and arya's travels
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-07-30
Updated: 2019-07-30
Packaged: 2020-07-27 04:54:31
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 6,694
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20040244
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/thelandofnothing/pseuds/thelandofnothing
Summary: a quiet day in winterfell begins the whirlwind of peace.





	with just enough love to go round

**Author's Note:**

> title from twist - thom yorke 
> 
> here's the 4th instalment to my season 8 fix-it. i wrote all the pieces during the episodes. 
> 
> i hope you guys enjoy this one, it's a bit different to anything i've written before

Even with night falling readily, Gendry could still hear children playing in the yard.

Before the Battle of Winterfell, he remembered how mothers ushered their children to make way to the hundreds of carts that came from the South or the foreign armies that Daenerys had brought from across the Narrow Sea. _Spring is here, _Arya had said to him after it all ended and he remembered how she had smiled at her own words, a lightness in her eyes. After years of abiding by her house’s words, the very opposite was on the horizon. He could see it in the movement of the people of Winterfell; in their stride as they went along with their days, in their hardened features, in the presence of _many _children. Gendry rejoiced to hear the kids scream and chase each other through the busy yard, running in between the builders still fixing Winterfell’s decimated walls and washerwomen who scurried with baskets on their hips. It had been years since King’s Landing had burned, and when the dead had descended on the living. He almost found it impossible to adjust to a life where fighting and running away from the onslaught of wars was not the norm. Peace came with spring it seemed; days were languid and slowly getting longer. Not that he minded at all.

Once Daenerys had perished, Gendry had given up his lordship and returned to smithing, not knowing a single thing about nobility or the Stormlands only that Southern nobles were usually a pain in everyone’s arse. He often told himself that he could attempt to learn, but he was much too impatient to sit in a castle for years becoming the people he had always despised. Initially, he had joined Arya when they sailed to Essos and they had spent years travelling, searching for new places and building their relationship. When they had returned to Westeros two years ago, he had most of the Winterfell forge to himself as the other smiths were sent back to other Northern keeps to help rebuild.

He was quite fine with settling down for a while, but Arya insisted they travel down South to the Crossroads Inn to meet Hot Pie and then continue on elsewhere to the Stormlands and Dorne. But with an arse that was still unused to horseback travel, and his preference for quiet working day and mug of ale in the night, he had asked to stop going along with her escapades so often. He had even told her he was perfectly happy if she wanted to go off alone for a while, leaving him to stay in Winterfell to look after their son. She had reacted badly at first, ignoring him entirely for weeks and going off by herself; short little trips to Wintertown or further up to the remains of Castle Black to see if there was any news from Jon. But after a few moons, she had returned to his bed in the forge and made an effort to include herself in castle affairs much to her sister’s delight. Even with her family in Winterfell, Arya had been restless and uneasy in her home. He couldn’t count the amount of times in the last few years when she had dragged him across the North, pretending to teach him about geography and Northern houses but truly just finding any excuse to travel on her mare through the forests and Northern highlands. He was sure that she enjoyed his companionship enough, he never saw her take anyone else on her frequent little excursions. He admitted that he liked the attention, _a lot, _especially when they curled together in their shared sleeping roll underneath the stars like they did as children. He knew that becoming stationary was nearly unthinkable for her, but he could tell now that she was getting used to it, enjoying the longer days and reacquainting to her childhood home. He himself had grown used to the Northern chill that stayed with the spring air. He loved the security Winterfell provided for their little one and the familiarity he found with his once war-time comrades.

“Are you getting up any work done or just daydreaming?” he heard her teasing voice before he could even fathom how quietly she had slipped into the forge.

He looked up and saw her leaning in the walkway, wearing light leathers and a simple fur cloak. She had a tray of food in her hands filled with a bread roll, a cup of broth and some kind of preserved meat as well as a cake and an apple. She set it down at his workbench and strode over to him.

“Never took you for a serving girl m’lady,” he teased, tucking a loose strand of hair behind her ear when she came close enough.

“Shut up and eat your dinner,” she told him but remained still as he cupped her face with his sooty hand. He leant in and kissed her sweetly even though the smell of the hot broth was making his belly grumble. When she pulled away, he clasped her hand and followed her to the tray, pulling out a stool out so he could eat. He watched in the corner of his eye as Arya hopped up on the bench and looked down at him carefully until he saw her hand sneak out to grab the bread. He swatted at it and observed how quickly a frown mustered on her face.

“I’m hungry,” he told her, and she rolled her eyes and crossed her arms over her chest. She knew almost definitely she would get some of his food eventually even if she already ate. He would never understand why it was the case, but she seemed to enjoy breaking bread with him.

By the time he had finished the meats and was halfway through his broth, he grabbed the bread roll and shred it in half, passing one to Arya. She took it without saying anything and eyed the cake he was about to devour too.

“I’ll leave you half, don’t you worry,” he surrendered, rolling his eyes.

Suddenly her face lit up with a smile and she tore at the hard bread with her teeth, smiling at him while she chewed.

“Yeah, yeah…” he grumbled under his breath, “M’lady is only happy when I give her my food.”

She finished eating and slid off the bench, moving towards the cake and breaking it apart unequally, giving him the bigger piece.

“Totally not true, I’m happy when you make me things too,” she grinned, reaching under her jerkin with her fingers to fish out the wolf pendant he had made her. Looking more closely he noticed that she was even wearing the simple metal band on her finger too. He wasn’t much of a jeweller but the other smiths, when they had time, taught him a thing or two, especially when he mentioned that he was intending them to be gifts to a certain lady.

“That’s about it, innit?” he teased as she took a small bite of the apple and then passed it to him.

“Don’t be a grump,” she told him, squeezing his shoulder, “I love you for all of those reasons and more.”

He snorted and shook his head, “You’re being unbelievably romantic and it’s unsettling.”

“Would you rather I hit you?” she threatened him, and he stifled a chuckle by biting into the apple.

He chewed and wiped the juice from his face with the back of his hand.

“Hit the man that gives you all his food? How cruel,” he goaded her and watched her roll her eyes.

“Even when _I _am the one who got the man his food,” she grumbled, hopping off the table, “It’s getting late, come on and finish up.”

“As you wish m’lady,” he obeyed with a smirk, getting up and dusting the crumbs from his leather apron. He looked up to see Arya toying with a horseshoe absentmindedly, her brows furrowed in thought, “You alright?”

Her eyes met his and they softened immediately as she let out a sad smile.

“I was training with a soldier from Bear Island today… You should have heard him talk about Lyanna Mormont.”

He tucked the stool under his bench and moved to douse the fires.

“She was a fierce thing,” he agreed, chucking a barrel of water on the embers and listening to how it sizzled, “Killed a giant… Tormund was impressed.”

He could tell Arya was smiling at the imagery and that made him happy too even though it was sad to dwell on the war.

“No one’s over it, are they? What happened, I mean, with the wars.” she said softly, and he turned to peer at her.

Gendry knew what she had said was correct; there was no running from their past. They both had such daunting and paralysing nightmares during some nights, and it was never uncommon for them to comfort one another when slivers of their past disrupted what was meant to be a peaceful time for rest. It seemed that the whole keep was cursed with the same displeasure; he would never forget Sansa Stark’s screams one night, so loud that Arya had once leapt from their bed to go and calm her. When he had followed her silently, he had seen the Queen of the North as she had thrashed and cried, mumbling unintelligently until Arya’s whispers of sweet nothings and soft hands carding through her hair kissed by fire, had quelled the terrors. He had always admired her empathy and found that it was much more pleasurable to see the true, unbridled version of his closest friend, the woman he loved. She had even made time during the day to comfort men, women and children alike who were torn apart by the horrors of the battle. She listened to them, held them as they mourned and wept for those they had lost. She didn’t forget him either; sometimes he jerked awake so violently he shook the bed enough to startle her. She would hold him against her chest as he breathed in the scent of her, until his breathing had slowed.

“We won’t forget,” he answered, breaking out of his melancholy. She never told him about her own dreams, but she often cried after them and all he could do was hold her, kiss her and tell her that he was there, “No one can forget Arya, that’s the problem…”

Suddenly, someone little bustled through the forge, a whirl of raven hair and little ashy limbs.

“Mama I fell off a horse!” Ned yelled, proudly showing her a massive bruise on his arm.

Arya’s eyes went wild in shock and he was no better. His heart began to fill with panic.

“That’s nothing to be celebrating,” Arya chastised worriedly, looking up to him while running a hand through their boy’s hair. He pursed his lips.

“Takes after his wild mother,” Gendry said under his breath, ignoring the glare he knew was coming his way, “Neddy, who was letting you ride horses this late at night?”

The cheeky little wildling pressed his lips together mischievously and looked up with his large blue eyes. _Eyes like a doe, _he remembered Arya saying right after she had pushed the big bugger out, nearly damn killing her. But he was no stag, their boy was all wolf and Gendry had wished for nothing less.

“It’s just riding Papa,” Ned said innocently.

“Well it doesn’t look very good,” Gendry grimaced at the blue welt, “Let’s go see Maester Wolkan,” he announced, and the boy immediately went feral.

“I’m fine! Mama tell Papa I don’t need to see Maester Wolkan, please!”

Arya just shook her head and stood up, “Listen to your father.”

“Papa…”

“Gotta see if anything’s broken little one,” he softened, and ruffled the hair on the boy’s head. He and Arya were protective parents, especially after all that had happened to them as children and he knew that he wanted Ned to go through nothing that they did. Hopefully, the boy would not even have to witness a battle, “You’re still growing.”

“You need to be big and strong,” Arya smiled and cupped the boy’s face, “Strong like your Papa.”

“And like Mama,” Gendry added, and he watched her expression drop mysteriously.

“Come on, both of you.”

He picked Neddy up and put him on his shoulders, leading his family out of the forge. Although he adored the North, many people in Winterfell were still wary of Arya and him especially since they had Ned. They still weren’t married; Gendry had asked her half a dozen times, but she had always given him a teasing look and said she’d think about it. _Think about it my arse, I’ve been asking for years. _He shook his head at the thought and focused on the fact Arya had chosen him to have a family with. It was often baffling to him (and to others) that the mother of his son was the Saviour of the Realm, the Bringer of Dawn, but even that didn’t stop the talk of vexatious lords whose looks and whispers managed to turn his mood blacker than any storm.

But in the end; as long as he was nothing like the man who had sired him; he willingly remained loyal to Arya and tried his hardest to be the best father for his son. The news of fathering their little one had always been a funny story; he remembered asking why Arya wasn’t drinking her ale one night when they were eating outside during a feast and his love had casually told him it was due to the child in her womb as if she were telling him about the weather. He had spat out his own ale through both his nose and mouth, watching as she continued to eat like nothing had happened. But soon the shock had melted into euphoria, and the only thing he felt was the complete joy of the prospect of raising a family. He shivered at the memory; it had always given him goose bumps at how surreal his life was these days. He had everything a man could ask for… Except for the ability to call the woman he loved, his wife.

“Cold?” Arya whispered, noticing him, “I’ll warm you up after.”

He chuckled and put a hand on the small of her back, still keeping Ned steady with his other arm.

“Behave, Stark.”

She stuck her tongue at him.

Arya knocked on Wolkan’s door when they had finally walked up to the keep. A withered, kind face peered back, and he saw her smile.

“Lady Arya, everything alright?”

“Ned fell off a horse and you know him, tough as nails. Just want to check.”

The older man chuckled and opened the door.

“Sorry my lady, I was just finishing some papers for your lady sister so excuse the mess.”

“Arya, please,” she told him, “Call me Arya and there’s no need to apologise.”

The man nodded his head and smiled, continuing on to check Ned’s bruised arm while the boy fussed and tried to make eye contact with him, puckering his lips. _Don’t you dare turn those eyes on me, _he thought. He would be fully gone if they had a daughter.

The maester was done in minutes and smiled positively.

“Just a bit of a sprain but nothing serious, keep him off the riding for a couple of days until the bruising gets better and he should be fine.”

“Thank you,” Gendry sighed, tugging Ned towards the door, “We’ll do our best.”

“I think it’ll be a good time to learn your letters and numbers properly,” Arya proposed, and Ned screwed up his nose in the utmost offence, “Oh don’t give me that look, you don’t have a say in the matter and Papa here would thoroughly agree.”

Gendry huffed through his nose, nodding his head. 

“Good night to both of you, sleep well,” Wolkan called as they went through the door.

“You to,” Arya said back, smiling.

By the time they reached Ned’s room, the boy was fast asleep against his father’s chest. He lay him down in his furs and both he and Arya looked down at him fondly. After cupping the boy’s face and with a squeeze to his bicep, she left the room and he bent, giving Ned a kiss on the forehead before joining her. When he entered their room, he thanked the Gods that someone had filled a tub with steaming water so they could clean up. His tunics and aprons protected his body from the soot of the forge, but his face always was covered in grime by the end of each day. He looked up and saw Arya watching him, a sleepy smile on her face.

She stripped her leathers off until she was stark naked beside him, her fingers working nimbly to remove her hair of her normal Northern braid that now trailed down her back, dark and long. He followed suit and climbed into the tub and helped Arya in too by holding her forearms until she sat contently in between his legs with her back to his chest. He let her find a comfortable position before he began to knead her tight shoulders.

“I bend steel all day and I come back bend the knots in your back?” he teased. She sighed in delight and her muscles went slack, her body slumping forward, “That better?”

She managed to mumble some variation of ‘yes’ before groaning when he reached a knot.

“Why am I so tired?” she grumbled as he moved his fingers to her scalp and massaged gently, “I was so winded today while I was sparring.”

He cupped the water and rinsed her hair, moving his hands and the soap to her neck and her shoulders where he repeated his actions. He massaged down her body, coming to her breasts where he felt her let out a breathy moan as he cupped them and pressed a kiss to the crook of her neck.

“Winded, hey?” he asked and felt her shift in the tub to face him, grabbing the cloth and mirroring his preening of her, “That’s unlike you.” 

She rubbed the soot from his face and his neck, gently circling the cloth in the way he taught her to properly remove the grime from his skin. He watched her carefully as she groomed him, his hands firmly on her hips as she sat lightly on his lap. There seemed to be a distant look on her face despite her concentration on getting him clean. Her hands moved to his scalp and he closed his eyes in ecstasy.

“Maybe I’m just getting old and my bones hurt.”

He let out a hearty laugh and squeezed her waist, moving forward to take the cloth from her hands, “If you’re getting old then what I am?”

She let out a soft smile and sighed when he deliberately wiped her belly and her thighs.

“It’s like I’m with child,” she said, and his stomach made a swooping motion. Leave it to her to say something like that so causally.

“It’s like you’re with child…” he repeated out loud, stilling his movements “Have you been feeling sick in the mornings?”

“No, but again, you know I didn’t feel sick at all with Ned. It’s probably nothing Gendry,”

“What about your moon blood?” he questioned.

“Sometimes it doesn’t come at all, so I can’t be sure,”

“Have you been drinking tea?” he raised an eyebrow and she shrugged.

He draped the cloth on the edge of the tub and willed her to turn around, feeling grateful when she complied and leaned her head back on his shoulder as they intertwined their fingers and sat sated in the warm water. Even with his arms around her waist, he knew there was something wrong, the way he could feel how tense her shoulder blades were and how her fingers were fidgeting with his. He realised he hadn’t seen her like this since they reunited years ago, and the thought chilled him to the bone.

“What’s wrong Arya?”

He felt her jolt at his words, but she didn’t bother turning around and making eye contact. He never liked to unsettle her, but it was so rare of her to go to those dark places in her head that the past had created. He had learnt about them whenever she had a nightmare so gripping that her screams shook the walls of their room.

“Are you angry at me for not marrying you?”

His arms stilled around her, “Why would I be angry?”

“Well, maybe you feel humiliated. When I rejected you the first time…”

He let out a dry laugh and sat up straighter in the water forcing her up as well.

“How can I be humiliated? By the grace of the Gods, you’ve given us a child Arya… I mean, _think_about it, we’ve got our pack, we have a family,” he gestured, making a circle with his hands so she could see clearly, “You two are the most important people in my life and I wouldn’t trade that for anything. As long as we’ve got our family, as long as you want to stick around me for the rest of our days… Then I’m fine, I guess.”

“Don’t you want another child?” she asked him truthfully and he looked away, trying not to bite his bottom lip anxiously.

Gods, did he want to see Arya heavy with his child again, a little girl perhaps, small in a bundle of blankets and in his arms with a tuff of black hair like Ned’s had been. To grow up as beautiful as her mother, and as fierce as her too with wolfs blood running through her veins. But Gendry was there when Arya nearly bled to death trying to push their son out. They were whispers everywhere, _Lyanna Stark died in her birthing bed. _A bastard’s curse, he told himself, he hadn’t even meant to get Arya with child, but she had insisted that she wanted him. Tyrion Lannister had chuckled when he first met little Ned when he was an infant and said, _the seed is indeed strong. _Arya had laughed along simply like she hadn’t nearly died that day leaving him furious as a stampeding bull.

She sighed and broke him out of his spiral.

“I’m taking that as a no,” she concluded, and he felt her body become more defeated than he had ever seen it in six years.

“Gods, _no _Arya!” he fully sat up and held her against him, willing for her to look at him, “You don’t know how long I’ve wished for a little girl. I just don’t want you to…”

“What?” she snapped, turning around and staring right through his soul. _God those eyes will be the death of me…_

“Don’t want anything to happen,” he managed to mumble out and she gave him a peculiar look, “I mean last time...”

Her face softened and she cupped his cheek, “You worry too much, we’re making life not taking. The Gods would want it to happen.”

“You don’t know that,” he sulked, pouting and looking away, “There was so much blood that time, I nearly passed out myself.”

“Look you buggering bull,” she pinched his nose playfully and he moved to swat her away, “I could have taken moon tea and not had our Ned at all, but I wanted him. I wanted you and I to be a proper family because I knew you never had one. I was sceptical before Neddy but now I wouldn’t mind expanding our little pack.”

She gave him a wink and lay back against his chest, her hair wet and pushed back behind her ears. An angel, Arya Stark was his angel, a beautiful warrior of an angel that the Gods sent down to torture him.

“So, you’re sure you’re with child?” he asked, pressing a kiss to her temple.

She bit her lip and nodded, running her fingers against his forearms that gripped around her.

“I saw a village woman two days ago, she confirmed my suspicions,” she admitted, and he smiled, “I was going to tell you Gendry, I swear.”

In response, he kissed the crook of her neck. 

He knew she had omitted from the truth the first time only to gauge his reaction before telling him. It was unlike her to be afraid of what other people thought of her and he definitely didn’t understand why she was so scared of what he thought about the child growing in her womb. There couldn’t be anything more wonderful than that. His heart was beating excitedly in his chest at just the very thought even with the fear budding in the background.

He fell back against the tub and closed his eyes, moving his hands to rest on her belly. He willed to feel the movement of their child in her womb but only felt the plane of her somewhat flat stomach as she breathed gently. All her symptoms made sense now, she had been so lethargic but still equally as ravenous for him in the recent moon, hungry and craving sweets…

“You want to know the funny thing?” she asked softly, twisting to kiss him under his jaw and he opened one eye to look down her, “Bran was the one to tell me, and at the oddest moment too.”

He raised both of his eyebrows.

“It was along the lines of, don’t name her Lyanna. All while I was bloody sparring,” she snorted and watched as he rolled his thumb over their joined fingers.

“_Her?_” he clarified excitedly.

“Well, he was right the first time… For Ned.” she insinuated and then laughed when she saw his face.

“You know you mean the world to me Arya, don’t you?” he said, kissing her shoulder.

Suddenly she rose from the tub and got out, water dripping in the rivets of her skin. Her scars gleamed under the candlelight and her hair was stuck to her back in a way that was way more enticing than anything should be. He felt his head swim with need, the way she padded like a wolf through their room with her bare arse. The nerve she had to tease him.

“I know that stupid and the feeling is mutual,” she replied, her back still turned from him, “Spit it out, I know you there’s something you want to say.”

She was dressing now, pulling a shift over her body and small clothes up to her toned legs.

“Let me give a name to our children,” he said suddenly, rising from the tub too and waiting for her reaction.

“Gendry…Ned is a Stark, this little one will be too” she replied with frustration, running her fingers through her hair. 

“They’re bastards in everyone but your family’s eyes Arya.” he felt his brows furrow subconsciously and anger boil in his veins, “I don’t need to give them _my _name, I just want to… To be more recognisable as their father.”

“_Our _family stupid, Sansa is as much your sister as she is mine. She tells you all the time. I’m with you and I’ve bore you a child, I’m _bearing _you a second child. Seven Hells Gendry, what more do you want from me?” she exclaimed, running a hand over her face.

“I want you to be my wife, so my children aren’t bastards!” he yelled back and the pain and resentment he kept hidden in his thorax was finally released, “I can’t lie to you anymore, it’s killing me.”

Her eyes had widened at his response and she stood, unmoving in front of him. She seemed to want to say something, but she couldn’t find the words. It was until he looked away and went to find some sleeping clothes that she managed to formulate a coherent sentence.

“Ned isn’t a bastard Gendry, he’s a Stark like me, like you.”

“I’m no Stark,” he scoffed and pulled a pair of woollen breeches on, “I’m the bastard of a dead king who rejected the title the Dragon Queen threw at him and we’re not married which means, despite you saying otherwise, my son is a bastard too. Exactly like I feared.”

“Like you feared?” Arya questioned, her hands on her hips.

He stared at her incredulously, a horrified and unbelieving look taking shape on his face. He couldn’t understand why she could be so nonchalant about the insecurity that hovered over him since he was a boy but deep down he knew; she would never truly understand the qualms of being the lowest of the earth, baseborn and spat upon by those who were higher in society.

“Have you not learnt anything by being with Jon and I all your life? There is nothing good that comes from being a bastard Arya. It was alright in those years when it was just you and I travelling around the world but now… You’re a lady, not even that, you’re a princess too and just because you don’t care about what people say behind our backs doesn’t make it right for me. No matter how much you protest it, you’re a lord’s daughter and I am a common lowborn bastard of a dead fat king.”

She looked down as he pulled a tunic over his head.

“Gendry…”

The quietness in her voice killed him. He knew that his need for validation was not enough to make her marry him. Like she had said, it was her choice in the end, and he could never force her. He watched as a tear slipped down her cheek and his heart splintered into a million spear-like fragments, puncturing the cavern of his chest painfully. He moved over to her and took her by the arms, kissing her cheek lightly.

“I understand that you don’t want to marry me Arya… I know and I’m sorry, I never meant to make you uncomfortable and upset. You know I would never push this without a good reason,” he explained as softly as he could, going to their bed and climbing under the furs, “Please come to bed and forget I said anything. It was stupid, it’s just my insecurities acting up again. I love you and I love Ned, and it should just remain at that. We’re a family, and you think me a Stark just like the rest of the pack so… So, I’m grateful.”

She listened wordlessly, going to their bed too but turning on her side so far from him that she might as well slept on the floor. He lay on his back, looking at the ceiling to avoid the presence of the wall growing between them. A dangerous part of him wondered if she stayed with him only for the obligation of their child but if that were so, they wouldn’t share a room that she called _theirs. _Maybe she believed that marriage for a woman made her weak, tied her down and made her conform to social normalcy. He never wished for her to feel as though she was weak, and he thought that their marriage might challenge those stereotypes, to empower her as a woman of her people. Instead, he could hear her people whisper how wicked it was for the Lady of Winterfell to let a bastard blacksmith ruin her, let alone birth his bastard son. Nearly everyone he encountered except for her sister had voiced the very truth but he made her happy, he made her smile and laugh and blush even. No one else he had ever met made her do any of those things and he was also content in the knowledge that _he _was the father of _their _child. They had survived those awful years and after all, nothing mattered beside family. Most of the men and their upturned noses hadn’t gone anywhere near a battle.

He rolled onto his side and grabbed Arya by the waist, pulling her to his front and smothering her in his arms.

“Don’t pity me love,” he said into her hair, “I would never force you into anything. That’s not the man I am, and you know that Arya.”

She curled within herself and gave out a sob which took him off guard. He hated when she cried, it reminded him too much of the nightmares that plagued the darkness.

“Please don’t cry,” he whispered in a shaky breath against her neck as if he would begin to weep too, “I love you, I love you so much.”

She shivered and let out a few softer cries until her breathing returned to normal and she went dead in his arms. He called her name softly but didn’t answer and instead of trying to get her to respond, he closed his eyes and willed to sleep.

* * *

When he woke, it was still pitch black, but the bed was noticeably empty.

He panicked and sat up so quickly that he was saw stars. Leaping out of the bed, he looked out of the window, looking if he could see anything in the courtyard but with no luck, so he scanned his brain where she could have gone, not wanting to think what his words earlier in the night had made her do. He slipped on his boots and exited their room, moving down the hallway until he suddenly saw the door to Ned’s room slightly ajar. He peeped through and saw Arya snoring away with the little one wrapped in her arms, his head resting on her breast. The sight brought tears to his eyes and he stood in the doorway unmoving as he felt salt drip down his face.

“Did you and Arya have a fight?” Sansa’s voice called from behind him in the hallway and he swore that he jumped three feet into the air.

“Gods, you scared me half to death,” he rubbed a hand over his face and turned to face her. She was wrapped in a fur robe and her loose red hair fell softly down her back, “Can’t sleep?”

“Answer the question Gendry,” the Stark woman turned her crystal blue eyes on him, and he audibly gulped. The Queen in the North was known to roam the halls of the Keep, an unsleeping auburn-haired ghost who was cold as the walls of Winterfell.

“We had a misunderstanding… Not a fight,” he explained and then her eyes softened, “About marriage…”

Sansa nodded her head in understanding, and he watched her thumbs twiddle.

“It’s a touchy subject with her, isn’t it?”

He bit his lip and nodded numbly. Arya’s sister was a cold woman, but he could tell she liked him well enough. She often commented on how alike Ned and he looked and was ever the doting aunt. Arya would tell him when they were alone that the Sansa she knew as a child would have detested him. 

“Why do you think she’s so afraid of marrying?” she asked silently and looked past him at the sight of Arya and Ned sleeping soundly together.

“It’s not her,” he answered truthfully, “Because having a blacksmith’s child wasn’t a shove in the Northern lords’ faces and their bloody marriage proposals enough.”

“You want Ned to have a proper name, don’t you?” Sansa said, knowing what was plaguing his heart, “Gendry… He’s a Stark.”

“I’ve always hated being a bastard, it’s exactly what I wished for any child of mine not to be. I didn’t want the name of some man who didn’t even know I existed. Arya understands that but she doesn’t understand that marriage would make things better. For Ned, for myself… Even for her,” he confessed. He loved Arya, loved her and Ned more than life itself but he would never try and attempt to make her something she wasn’t.

“I think it’s conflicting for her,” Sansa said knowingly, “She wants it for you, but she’s scared what it will mean for her.”

“I would never force her…” 

“I think she only has one understanding of what a wife is,” she told him pointedly, “Our mother was the epitome of female nobility; tied to the claim of her husband. Although their marriage had blossomed into love, she still came second, she was still a product of a system her daughters have defied. Look at me, a twice married Queen without a husband to rule at my side. And Arya, she’s the Saviour of the Realm and loves a blacksmith.”

His heart felt warm, sometimes their story of love sounded like a song. Some orphan little girls that had taken a liking to him had told him as much when he recited their journey.

“She only belongs to herself, I’m not here to take her name away and I love her for who she is. Never seen her act like a bloody highborn lady a day in my life. Pain in my arse, the slayer of the damn Night King? Sure, but not a lady,” he screwed up his face in confusion.

She sighed and played with the pleats in her nightgown.

“I wished she married you, it would have stopped the rumours. What they say is horrible and to think they’d treat the Saviour of the Realm with such degradation.”

“The talk is getting to me too,” he confessed, and she looked at him sadly, “I know that she’ll tell me to get over it, but I feel so…”

“I don’t care what they say about me and you both shouldn’t either.” Arya’s voice hissed from the darkness.

Both Sansa and he whipped around to see her sitting up in Ned’s bed, glaring at the both of them accusatorially. 

He let out a sigh as Sansa wished them good night and started hurriedly down the hallway. He entered Ned’s room and closed the door, tugging his boots off.

“Do you want me to come back to bed?” she asked hesitantly, she too probably noticed how the air chilled between them, “I only went to check on him and I caught him reading.”

He shook his head fondly, “You don’t have to explain yourself to me, he’s your son as much as mine,” he stood by the bed and lifted the furs, “Move aside.” 

She snorted softly, “You’ll break the bloody bed.”

But she shifted so he could fit in beside their boy, having him rest in between them as he lay on his side, brushing the hair away from his little forehead.

“He’s so beautiful…” he said as if it were all a dream, watching his son’s youthful face twitch in his sleep, “Just like his mother.”

“He’s your carbon copy, doesn’t have an inch of me,” she said softly but he chuckled lightly.

“Look carefully, he’s got your nose,” he nodded his head towards their sleeping son, ghosting his thumb over Ned’s face, “And all that spirit, that’s all you as well. He’s always been our little wolf.”

He chuckled softly and sneaked an arm around her waist to pull both Ned and her closer to his body. He felt Arya’s gaze on him in the stillness of the room and he reached for her hand.

“You’re right,” he told her in a whisper, stroking her fingers with his thumb, “Nothing matters but this one, raising him, making sure he’s protected, that he grows up to be a good little man.”

“Aye, and this one too,” Arya reminded him, bringing their joined hand to her belly making his heart swell in pride, “The lone wolf dies but the pack survives.”

“Our pack,” he said so softly it was nearly lost in his breath, “Arya… You gave us this family.”

“We’ve always been family Gendry and I didn’t do this alone.”

He smiled and caressed her face in the dark, feeling the warmth of his family envelop him, sending him into a slumber so deep he dreamed of the wild woman that was his forest lass and himself, riding with two raven haired children like a family of outlaws.

**Author's Note:**

> comments and kudos are always greatly appreciated and i take time to read feedback and lovely words from all of y'all. have a great day wherever you are!


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